


Half ghost life

by Whydidtheydothis



Category: Victoria (TV)
Genre: Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M, Sad, spoilerish for series 3, you will all hate me for this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-28
Updated: 2019-01-28
Packaged: 2019-10-18 05:36:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 868
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17574887
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Whydidtheydothis/pseuds/Whydidtheydothis
Summary: Alfred feels his life is pointless





	Half ghost life

**Author's Note:**

> Soooooooo series 3 is just awful, so much worse then even I thought it would be. Lord Alfred is virtually invisible as a character and its as if series 2 never happened. So as always my way of dealing with it, is to write it out.
> 
> this is really sad and hopeless so you have been warned xxxx

Alfred knows Drummond is the one who is actually dead; the one who is lying under the earth in the churchyard but, he reflects he may as well be. Without Drummond’s presence he feels as insubstantial as a wraith, drifting through the Palace, alive but not really there, dying a little more every day.

He regretted his proposal to Wilhelmina almost as soon as he made it. Her kindness paired with the deliberate obliviousness of people he thought were his friends (he was still bitter that after all he had given Victoria, neither she nor Albert had thought to bother to break the news of Drummond’s death to him) had made him reach out to her like a drowning man. But there was no happiness there, not for him and sadly not for her. “A different kind of love” he’d said to her, hoping she would understand that he meant he would never love her as he loved Edward, or as a man generally loves a woman but alas she had not. It had been wrong of him he knew now to even mention the word “love” because she had loved him, and as a woman loves a man. He’d allowed himself to believe she saw him as just a friend because it was easier for him and he’d hoped, foolishly he now saw, that she would realise it was a marriage of convenience for them both but she had not.  He should have known so much better; how could someone barely out of girlhood with a head filled with romantic notions about love and marriage, who had been unable to see Prince Ernest for what he really was, understand the ways of the world?

The wedding night had been hellish; she who had read far too much Walter Scott had wanted romance; a loving deflowering not a man who just wanted it over and done with. He’d done his best, he’d been gentle and kind all the while hating himself but he knew from her muffled sobs in the night that it had fallen far short of her hopes. He’d turned on his side and wept silently for her, himself and his beloved Edward lost to him forever.

As the months passed, her happiness and excitement at being his wife had turned to sadness and disenchantment and both of them were heartily relieved when she became pregnant and they could dispense with their night time activities. She had left court for her confinement in the country, and she seemed almost unreal to him now, as if from another life. He stayed at court only because it was a better option that being stuck in the country with Wilhelmina's reproachful presence reminding him of his mistake. However, without Drummond court was boring and his existence pointless. The merry quips that had once fallen from his lips, the carefully arched eyebrow at the right moment as courtiers hid smiles behind fans and gloves; they were no longer part of him. He had no heart to amuse people or to care for their petty squabbles; besides the tragedy of losing Edward, everything paled into insignificance. He felt he was no more than a piece of furniture, part of a set that the Queen moved from place to place, not particularly wanted but taken anyway from force of habit. He attended balls, receptions, dinners, played his role in ceremonies but always feeling one step removed and as invisible as if people could put their hands right through him.

Emma Portman was the only one who noticed, but then she noticed everything. One day whilst they were out walking, trailing behind the Queen and her entourage she had said to him quietly

“You must not grieve forever Alfred; he would not have wanted that”

He had looked at her and replied softly

“I do not know how to do anything else”

She had tightened her hand on his arm sympathetically

“The pain will stop eventually”

And he had smiled sadly

“But I do not want it to stop Emma. It is the pain that makes me know I’m alive”

And she had shook her head and turned away but not before he had seen the tears in her eyes

 

And now here they were at Osborne House by the sea. As no one really seemed to notice or care whether he was there or not, he spent a lot of time at the beach staring out at the waves, listening to them wash onto the shore. He fancied he heard Drummond’s voice in them. He was so weary, so immensely weary of being alone, and Edward had only been gone 2 years; he could have to live the half ghost life for many many more years yet. He picked up a stone and flipped it idly through his fingers

“Alfred…..Alfred….” the gentle waves seemed to say “Alfred……”

He stood up and put the stone in his pocket and then suddenly his mind cleared; he picked up another stone and then another methodically filling his clothes

“Alfred…..Alfred…” whispered the tide flowing in and out

“I’m coming Edward, I’m coming” he said as he walked across the shingle and into the sea

 

 


End file.
